I believe before if you had multiple accounts at IB, the $30 in commissions to negate the $10 data fee was calculated by totalling up all commissions in all accounts. IB recently made it so all accounts are segregated in terms of the commission total. So let's say you have 3 accounts and you do $25 a month in commissions on each, you would pay $30 in data fees.
if you do $25 a month in commissions, you shouldn't be with IB. But anyway, I agree that the interest lost is too much especially when you have cash in multiple currencies. $500/year on USD, EUR300/year on EUR...and so on... Maybe IB should put some upper limit. It's just too much...
And just for balance... To point out one of the MANY positives about Interactive Brokers... "our interst of amounts exceeding $10,000 is exceptional" Thsi is an understatement, if anything. IB actually pays interest on your short position. This is entirely voluntary... A Fair Play policy that ** costs them a lot of money **. It's almost unheard of elsewhere... Maybe something a sizable BD might negotiate with their clearing firm. On my well-hedged 7 figure portfolio... That is typically about 55-45 long/short... I get NET POSITIVE interest. Wow. Truly amazing. Kudos to IB.
I'm not an IB cheerleader, but their policies are disclosed and pretty fair. I think they just don't want small inactive accounts and their policies reflect that. To the OP, if you like IB otherwise, why not put your 10k balance in something liquid that earns interest? You'll only pay .005/share to get in and out of it. A money market CEF or ETF would be perfect. Traveler
They even can not give you a fixed fee rate for forex. Because they have the authority to decide what exchange raye to use(historic ? or soemthing else). So I can not trade forex, becasue I do not know the cost.
if u can gimme a link that states ib charges interests for runnin' profits/losses and not marginable positions i would be glad, i looked deep and cannot find any.